Air passenger misses flight after glitch causes some smartphones to set time back 1 hour a week early
Company says the issue has now been resolved
If you woke up to see your phone's time is an hour earlier than it should be, you're not alone.
Many Manitobans and people across the country experienced a technical issue with their Bell smartphones Monday morning.
Kunle Akilbelu was scheduled to get on a flight to Toronto at 5:45 a.m., but missed his flight.
His phone showed a different time than his daughter's phone, so they decided to just go back to sleep, going off the time on his phone.
"I noticed the clock was one hour behind, so it really confused me," he said at Winnipeg James Richardson International Airport on Monday.
When they woke up and got to the airport at what was actually 5:15 a.m., not 4:15, the gate had already closed.
"Of course it was frustrating. I thought everything was automatic and we should not have difference [between phone carriers]," Akilbelu said.
Luckily the father and daughter are able to board a later flight at no cost to them.
A Bell spokesperson confirmed the problem Monday morning. Just before 8 a.m. CT, the spokesperson said the issue has been resolved and the update will be done automatically, but users may need to reboot their phones or go on airplane mode to trigger the time change.
Bell MTS said the issue impacted some Bell Mobility and Virgin customers, but the company wouldn't say how many Manitobans were affected. It said Bell MTS wireless customers are on a separate network.
Bell responds to reports that its smartphones went back 1 hour early today, a week before scheduled: 'Some of our mobility clients may have experienced an incorrect time change on their phone. Our teams are investigating...in order to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.'
—@CBCAlertsRodney Crampton was also affected by the technical problem. The man from Carman, Man. is scheduled to fly to Arizona on Monday, and was woken up early.
"I checked my phone status and it was an hour ahead of the clocks in the house, my wife's phone and our iPads, so it took me a while to figure out what's going on," he said.
"At first I thought ... I had the daylight saving time wrong."
Eventually, Crampton double checked the actual date clocks are supposed to turn back — which is next week, at 2 a.m. on Nov. 7 — and luckily made their flight.
"We were pretty sure everything else was saying the right time and my phone was wrong."
With files from Ian Froese